9. What steps is the Cabinet Secretary taking to ensure schools in Wales promote emotional resilience in children and young people? OAQ(5)0140(EDU)

Thank you, Lynne. Promoting the emotional resilience of children and young people must be understood within the wider context of their well-being. Higher levels of well-being are linked to increased educational achievement and engagement. For that reason, we are adding ‘well-being’ as a fifth objective in the next version of ‘Qualified for Life’.

Thank you, Cabinet Secretary. I was very grateful to you for meeting with Samaritans Cymru with me recently. As you know, they have been very, very keen on mainstreaming emotional resilience in the curriculum, and I'm sure they welcome, as I do, that you've gone further, really, in including well-being in ‘Qualified for Life’—that is very, very positive. However, as you know, I have raised previously the need for all Welsh Ministers to work together in partnership to deliver the aims of Together for Children and Young People. Are you able to provide any update on the work that you are doing to deliver your side of that partnership in terms of ensuring that we move as quickly as possible to ensuring that all schools are actively engaged in ensuring that emotional resilience is a priority?

Thank you, Lynne. It is absolutely crucial. As we discussed in committee this morning, there is much that we can do to prevent difficult situations for our young people and children, but we will never, ever be able to prevent them from experiencing life's ups and downs—whether that's bereavement, whether that is the break-up, perhaps, of a significant relationship in their life, whether that is bullying, we will never be able to protect them from all the challenges that they will face, but we can help them to be more resilient and allow them to cope better when those changes happen for them. You're absolutely right; I cannot do this alone. That is why I am very keen to work alongside my Cabinet colleague here, for health, to identify what opportunities there are for joint working. Most recently, we both identified a sum of money, which we hope to be able to deploy to tackle some of these very real issues in our high schools.

Thank you, Cabinet Secretary.